As a contributing author to the pre-nomination book by Webster Tarpley, “Obama: The Postmodern

Coup — The Making of a Manchurian Candidate,” I am uniquely disappointed to watch that book’s warning — that the election of Barack Obama would lead the world to war against Russia and China — unfolding in our present time.

The fact of the matter is that President Putin, Russia and China are not threats to the United States, but that we have become a threat to ourselves. In a betrayal of our own national

mission, we have adopted the economic program of our enemy, British “free trade,” monetarism and militarism, and rejected the American system of political economy (to use Henry Clay’s term) of internal improvements, and protection of agriculture and industry.

The threat Russia and China pose is not to the people of the United States, but to our bankrupt financial system, typified by Wall Street, which has hijacked our national economic policy, our political parties and our major media organs. In writing “Obama: The Postmodern Coup,” we knew that a financial crisis triggered by the collapse of a quadrillion dollar derivatives bubble was looming, and that Wall Street would push a candidate to serve its desperate interests, and not a true national leader in the mold of FDR or JFK we sorely need.

On learning that Zbigniew Brzezinski served as a senior campaign adviser to candidate Obama, the strategy of this administration became clear. In contrast to the Mideast-oriented outlook of the neo-cons, the grand chessboard of Brzezinski has always been about ruling the world through controlling Moscow and Beijing, a fact known too well by Putin.

It was also understood that the modus operandi for this would not be the overt war of the neo-cons, but covert operations, such as “color revolutions” like the neo-Nazi overthrow of Ukraine, financed with $5 billion from the State Department and billions more from Wall Street cut-outs like financier George Soros’s International Renaissance Foundation.

Infamously, it was Brzezinski under Carter who in essence launched al-Qaida in Afghanistan to lure the Soviets into a trap. More recently, it was Brzezinski who pushed the Bush administration to give asylum to Chechen terrorist asset Ilyas Akhmadov, still on the State Department payroll, which Pravda declared to be like Russia giving asylum to Osama bin Laden. So much for the war on terror! Indeed, Putin would state, “We can not have double standards when fighting terrorism, and it cannot be used as a geopolitical game.”

Obama, following the Brzezinski script, is playing the “Great Game” of British imperialism, utilizing perpetual war to control the world, as is the case with the war against Libya, Syria and now the Ukraine. For Bush it was “bombs away.” For “leftist” Obama it’s color revolution, tribal terror proxies, asymmetrical warfare, regime change — and if all else fails the type of direct bombing visited upon Libya.

Thank God so many Americans said no to a planned attack on Syria predicated upon a faked poison gas story, and that some in Congress were willing to impeach Obama, or this game might by now have moved to the brink of thermonuclear confrontation.

“But,” some protest, “Putin jailed Pussy Riot — he’s a tyrant!” Well, if a group of Wall Street-funded “artists” were filming their group orgies or masturbation with frozen chicken parts at the Rutland Hannaford, some leftists might have a different view.

Of course, Rutland is in the same situation as Russia when it comes to the flood of heroin. Most comes from Afghanistan under U.S. and British oversight. Perhaps Gov. Peter Shumlin should join with Russia’s call to have the poppy fields destroyed. Drugs are big money, and big money needs laundering, which takes big banks, and is easy to hide with the quadrillion dollar derivatives market swirling around.

And this is the point. The central choice we have to make as citizens is about our own economic system. The reason the American Revolution and Civil War were fought was to free America from the bondage of the British free trade economic model and to institute what became known as the American system of political economy, based on public control of money and credit, massive infrastructure projects, and the protection of manufacturing through tariffs.

Today we know “free trade” has not worked, yet the political system remains silent. Even the new black solar billboards around the state are certainly not made in America, but with cheap labor, because both parties sold the American worker and manufacturing out. Russia and China know better. We let cheap Chinese goods cross our border tax-free, but the Chinese auto industry keeps out Fords and Chevys with a 25 percent import tariff.

If it were not for Russia, the Union may have lost the Civil War. Yes, few know the fact that Russia pledged its fleet with an implicit threat to attack the British should it intervene to stop the Union blockade of the “free trade” confederacy. Russia was America’s friend in our war against imperialism, in our war against slavery, and in the war against fascism. Today, they can be our friend in economic development. We should learn to recognize a friend when we see one.

A few years back, Vermonters did call for the impeachment of President Bush, but I am afraid the principle of that call has been betrayed by politics, racism, and consent to the treason of our elected officials. Something must be done, to prevent the spark that could send the ICBMs flying, to prevent another president from inheriting this dictatorship, and to bring our nation and the world back from the brink.

Bruce R. Marshall is a resident of Rochester. He was the Green Party candidate for Congress in 2006.